


Before and Now

by WayFish



Category: Walking Dead, Walking Dead (TV)
Genre: Child Abuse, Child Death, Friendship, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Not Canon Compliant, whatever
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2012-12-26
Updated: 2014-03-17
Packaged: 2017-11-22 11:44:51
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 4
Words: 14,469
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/609476
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WayFish/pseuds/WayFish
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>So, I read this interview with Norman Reedus. I'm paraphrasing, but in said interview he says that he thinks of Daryl as kind of a virgin and that Daryl's interactions with The Group are probably the most contact he's had with people outside his family, possibly ever. I thought that was really interesting and I wrote this hot little mess.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

Daryl reached for the gun and Micah jerked away.  
“Micah, you don’t have to do this.”  
He shook his head and fixed Daryl with a hard stare. “Leave me alone.”  
Daryl had seen that look before.

 

* * *

 

Micah had volunteered to dig the graves. Said it was his turn and Daryl thought that was a strange thing to say. Taking turns like his mother used to yell at him, take turns, play fair. Taking turns burying the bodies. Daryl stood by while he dug, staring at his boots, listening to the pitch and fall of the dirt. Daryl knew it had nothing to do with fairness.

 

* * *

 

There had been four others. Daryl spotted them on the road from the wall. A couple, oldish. A teenager. The little girl, Jenny. And Micah. Each of them was skinny, almost all bones. None of them was armed. Daryl hadn’t been able to suppress his amused shock at the fact that such a motley crew had survived so long. He supposed someone might look at The Group and say the same thing. He’d still told Rick that they'd be more trouble than they were worth. But they answered Rick's questions. So they were allowed to stay. 

 

* * *

 

The teenager was bit. Not bad, just a graze of teeth from the looks of it. Had been hiding it for they didn’t know how long. Daryl put her down.  
They’d only been there a few weeks. And when the walkers shoved down that section of fence the old man was the first to go. The woman had rushed to help and they got her too. 

 

* * *

 

Micah’s hair, usually frizzed and curly was matted with sweat. Merle would have pointed out that he had jew curls. But Daryl watched the flex of his shoulders under his dirty blue t-shirt. He got it. He did. But still the symmetry of those three graves was unnerving, narrow and deep in a perfect line, half a shovels height exactly. The last body was nearly covered. And he knew it wasn’t the right thought for the time but Daryl wondered what it would feel like to fit his hands over the slope of those shoulders.

“Can you... would you just stop? Just for a minute?

Micah tossed down his shovel. “What do you want?”

“I know what I said but I just... ”  
  
“If I recall correctly you said never again, fucking faggot.”  
  
“I know. I’m sorry.”  
  
“You say that like it matters.”  
  
“It’s just been on my mind. You know, what happened.”

 

* * *

 

They were on watch, up in the tower. Just standing there, staring out the dusty windows and like it was nothing he just rubbed his palm over the front of Daryl's jeans and leaned close and was on his way to kissing him but Daryl hauled back and punched him in the face.  
  
“I’m sorry. I don’t know... I just thought-”  
  
“I don’t give a good goddamn what you thought,” Daryl roared, snatching him up by his shirt and pinning him to the rail. "You touch me again I will kill you.”  
  
And Micah laughed. Not many men had ever laughed at Daryl Dixon. Not to his face, anyway. “It’s the end of the world. What have you got to lose?” he said. “Just do it. I can feel you. I know you want to.”  
  
And the thing was, he did. They were flush together and there was just something about the warmth of another body pressed against his. The anger in his chest mixed with hunger and pooled hot in his belly. It was a familiar urge, one he hadn’t felt in a long time. But it came back easy and it must have been all over his face because Micah braved a kiss, soft and sweet, before he dropped to his knees. Daryl closed his eyes. He thought he would have to imagine someone else. But he didn’t.

 

* * *

    
“You can’t even say it, can you? Christ Daryl...”  
  
“I’m talking about before that. We were, you know, becoming friends-”  
  
“Friends?” Micah laughed, again, just like before and when he turned around Daryl saw his face was streaked with tears. “You don’t want a friend. You want convenient comfort.”  
  
“That’s not what I meant.”  
  
"I don’t care what you meant,” He said, wiping his face with dirt stained hands. “Just go, please.” Micah sighed and picked up his shovel.  
  
But Daryl couldn’t, because Micah looked like he felt. And the third grave was for some woman they'd brought in from Woodbury. He didn’t know her so well. And he didn’t even know the names of the couple. And he couldn’t just stand there and watch Micah struggling to catch his breath as tears kept tumbling down his cheeks. He took a step forward and Micah took a step back.  
  
“I said go.”  
  
“No.”  
  
Daryl caught him by the front of his shirt. He was stronger and he didn’t give Micah much choice in the matter, just cradled his face in his hands and brushed the dirt and tears from his cheeks.

 

* * *

 

They found an office that afternoon because maybe convenient comforts were what they needed. There was a picture of a blond woman and a similarly blond child framed and sitting on the desk. Micah turned the frame over  as he hopped up onto it. He hooked his fingers in Daryl’s belt but he dug in his heels.  
  
“I haven’t done this, much,” he said motioning to the space between them. “And never with a dude,” Daryl bit out. His cheeks felt hot and he braced for Micah to laugh at him. But Micah didn’t laugh. Instead he looked thoughtful for a moment and pushed the hair out of Daryl’s eyes.  
  
“It’s kind of funny how that stuff seems to still matter, even after everything.”  
  
Daryl didn’t think it was funny and shifted nervously. “I don't want you to think I’m... I don’t know. I don’t want it to be bad.”  
  
“How about you start with not calling the guy with their hand in your jeans ‘Dude’.”  
  
Daryl snorted. “I think I can do that.”  
  
And maybe it was funny. He let Micah reel him in till they were chest to chest and Micah had a leg hooked over his hip. Daryl thought slow and soft, soft and slow as he kissed him. And he could feel his own heart racing against Micah’s palm.  
  
“Just relax, yeah?” and Micah pressed a kiss to the base of his throat. Daryl nodded.  
  
“Yeah.” And that time he didn’t close his eyes.

 

* * *

   
Like all secrets and good things Daryl couldn’t keep it to himself. They found a case of beer on a run a week or so later. And they were sitting around that night drinking and talking and Micah was teaching Carl and Jenny some chords on the guitar.  
  
Carol had turned to him and said “I’m glad you fought for him to stay. He’s a good addition.” And Daryl, who didn’t seem to be able to hold his liquor as well as he used to, and suspected it had something to do with nearly starving to death on a regular basis, had smiled and slurred, “Did you know that the two of us were, well... the two of us? Don’t tell anyone. But we are.”  
  
He wouldn’t fully regret saying it until the next day when he was lucid. But it had become so regular, so close to normal that it kind of scared him. Every time they stole looks across the room or kissed when they were mostly sure they were alone Daryl was reminded that he'd had never had something that regular. Ever. And he had to share it just to know that it was really happening.  
  
Carol,  she hadn’t looked shocked at all, which Daryl found disappointing in a strange way. Just shook her head and laughed. Not like a malicious laugh, like he imagined Merle might laugh if he knew. More like a surprised, happy laugh. And she didn’t ask him any questions or anything. He’d realized that Micah and Carol were the only people he really talked to. Sure, The Group had been The Group for over a year. And Rick talked to him about all things surviving and walker killing. But no one else really knew him. Knew anything about him. Not like they did.

 

* * *

 

Carol never brought it up again, actually. Though Daryl secretly hoped that she would. Cause’ there was no way, no way in hell he could just outright ask. And he had some unanswered questions of his own. Some shit he wanted to talk out, even if talking wasn’t really his thing. Like why now, and not before?  And would he get used to kissing a face with stubble or the friction burn it left at the corners of his mouth? Did everyone find it as indescribably thrilling? Or was he the first person in the history of the now ending world to get turned on running their nails over another dude’s, guy’s, man’s, face scruff?  
  
Also, how was he supposed to feel about giving head? Was it weird if he liked it? Daryl had always enjoyed going down on girls. Maybe even enjoyed it a little too much. And he’d had nothing but praise for his performance. But the only experience he had with sucking cock was receiving. And judging by the put out, huffy attitude of every girl that had ever gone down on him ever, it was supposed to be pretty awful. Definitely not something you were supposed to like. But the first time Micah stroked his chin and swelled and came on his tongue Daryl kind of had to wonder how you could not.  
  
He tried to remember who he would have talked to about it before. Not Merle. Definitely not Merle. Not one of his friends. It was getting hard to remember too much about the Before. Partly because it kind of hurt. But mostly because the idea of living that way, so easy, seemed surreal, like science fiction, at this point.

 

* * *

   
It rained. Micah dragged him out into the courtyard while everyone else slept away the afternoon. They gathered water in buckets to scrub their faces and Daryl hadn’t even realized just how grime covered he was until the rain hit his shoulders and rolled down his chest in muddy brown streaks.  
  
Micah kissed the back of his neck and whispered, “I want you”. And he’d known by the way Micah said it that he wasn’t just saying I want you. Because it was the way he would have said it Before. He might have pressed against a girl’s ass, slipping his fingers up her skirt and said soft and low “I want you” as in “I  want to fuck you”. But there was something else in it too. Like “I want you to be with me for the foreseeable future.” Or “I want you to keep living and and stop doing dangerous shit because I want you to keep being alive.” Maybe “I want you to take better care of yourself and remember to do things like eat and bathe because if you don’t I’ll have to do it for you.” And Daryl wasn’t necessarily adverse to this. He’d just been bad at that sort of thing Before. How the hell was he supposed to deal with it Now? Maybe he would have to ask Carol.

 

* * *

 

Daryl sometimes found himself spending immense amounts of time thinking about how they never got to have sex with no cloths on. Before he might have spent those stretches working or eating or paying bills because Merle never remembered or drinking or worrying or texting or playing video games or just staring out into space through the mesh on the back door.  
  
There had been so many things to fill up his time and brain then. But now he just had survival and Micah. And survival, well that almost didn’t require thought at this point. Swinging a machete at a walkers head came natural as breathing these days. But Micah, that was still new, That was a challenge. Messing up, that actually scared him. And they would get mostly unclothed but never totally naked. He was also curious about the fact that no girl he’d ever been with had ever paid a split second of attention to his legs but Micah would touch and kiss and lick and - jesus christ - bite his thighs and calves at every possible opportunity.  
  
Once he even left a thumb print sized bruise on Daryl’s hip, right in the place where his cargo’s rested on his waist. And he was hyper aware of it the whole time it was there, hyper focused on the feel of the weight of his belt across it. He got pinned down in a bathroom in a Conoco and while Glen cleared the walkers on the other side of the door he pressed his hand over it, like reaching for a gun that wasn’t there, didn’t even realize he was doing it actually, until he caught sight of himself in the bathroom mirror.  

 

* * *

 

  
He’d pretended that he didn’t know what Micah was saying. Said, “What do you mean.? I’m right here.”  
  
Micah had smiled and kiss him and Daryl suspected it was because he knew better.

 

* * *

 

Sometimes they would go to the prison library together. It was a stretch from their cell block and there were unspoken rules about not going anywhere alone so it didn’t look too strange. Daryl had never seen someone read the way Micah did. A new book every couple days. He would press Micah up against the stacks and say “How long you think it’ll take to read everything in here?” Micah would kiss him and say, “I know that it’s a library in a prison but I wish there was more stuff here that I could read to Jenny.”  
  
Daryl said he would look for some kids books on his next run. Or maybe Micah would like to come along? Turns out he did. He still felt new, still had something to prove. So that didn’t look terribly strange, either.  

 

* * *

 

Daryl wondered what they would have been like if they met before the walkers. In the background there was a nagging voice that reminded him that they simply wouldn’t have met. Ever.  
  
Micah was from Pittsburgh. Micah had gone to college. Micah had had a job that was not hourly. Micah had a battered picture of himself sitting at an outdoor cafe in Bordeaux . In the photo his face was clean shaven and a little more filled out. He was flipping off the camera, smoking a cigarette, and his mess of brown curls was falling across his eyes. To his right  there was a girl with dark curly hair, kind of like Micah, blue eyes like Micah, and a round face, kind of like Micah. She was smiling.  
  
When Daryl pointed out the resemblance he smiled sadly and told him that that was his sister. Her name was Rachel. That was her birthday. She was 23. She was going to grad school in Minnesota to study some sort of engineering. To his left there was also a broad, taunt looking blond man. He had his fingers in Micah’s hair and he was kissing him on the cheek. Daryl didn’t ask about the man and Micah didn’t tell.  
  
Daryl, well Daryl had had Merle, and a GED. He had never held down a job longer than a year, and had barely been outside the county before the walkers, let alone the country. Even if they had, somehow, met before and beat all those odds Merle still would have put bullets through them both if he ever found out.  
  
But still, in his head he played out scenes about bookstores and bars and loud bands. Bad movies and popcorn and arguing about who shot first. Mario Cart tournaments. He even thought about actual fights. Heated, voices raised fights about trivial things like dishes or suspicious text messages because apparently in his daydreams they lived together in domestic semi-bliss in a quite blue farmhouse/cozy apartment/beachfront condo depending on the scenario. He thought about making up and the things that came after.  
  
He even once had a dream about taking Micah to the 24 hour diner near his old house. Before, Daryl would go there to kill time when Merle was on a bender or he couldn’t sleep. All he’d ever ordered was the coffee, which was always bitter and lukewarm. But in the dream he ordered Micah a hamburger, fries, and a slice of pie. And he just sat there and watched him eat it.

 

* * *

 

  
He told Micah about his dream one night while stirring yet another can of beans over a fire in the yard. It was a cold night. One of the first they’d had in awhile but it meant they got to be alone. Micah laughed. Really laughed. Like full body, gasping for air, had to clutch at Daryl’s shirt to keep from falling over laughed. Daryl tried not to look wounded and shook him off.  
  
“Never mind. It was stupid. Just forget it.”  
  
“No. No, that’s not it,” Micah panted. “I was... God, I.. I was vegan before all this,” he said, motioning out at the walkers who were moaning and pressing against the fence. “I hadn’t had meat in, like, seven years. But now... Now I think I’d give a limb to eat a hamburger.”  
  
Daryl scrunched up his nose. “No meat?”  
  
“Nope.” Micah shook his head and kissed him and turned his face toward the sky. “Hamburger and french fries,” he sighed. “God.”  
  
“And pie,” Daryl corrected.  
  
“Oh now you’re just being cruel.”  
  
“And coffee?”  
  
“Daryl Dixon are you asking me out on a date?"  
  
“No. Yeah. I don’t know, maybe.”

 

* * *

 

He got his real fight.  
  
When he asked how old she was Jenny put up both hands, spread her fingers wide, curled them into fists, held up one finger.  
  
“So you’re eleven?” Daryl tried to keep his voice soft. She nodded.  
  
The girl was short for her age, with stringy red hair and wide grey eyes. She didn’t talk much and had a look about her kind of like a nervous dog, like she might spook and run at any moment. At first it seemed that she would literally cling to Micah wherever he went, which was, frankly, annoying. But Micah seemed to have an endless supply of patience for her. And slowly she got better, spending more time with Maggie, Carol and Carl. And he didn’t know what it was, because he’d never been around kids or taken care of a kid and if he was honest Daryl wasn’t even sure that he liked them but when Micah wasn’t around she would hang out with him.  
  
She was never in the way. She didn’t talk to him. She would just hang around, kind of awkwardly, sometimes following him like she thought he didn’t notice. And it didn’t bother him. Not really. It was just weird. Micah had gone on an errand with Glenn, Carl, and Rick. Maggie, and Carol were doing laundry. Hershel was napping in his cell. And Daryl was supposed to be clearing the walkers from the fence but there she was, watching him with her perpetual wide eyed expression. Daryl had learned to shoot when he was nine so he didn’t see the problem.  
  
He knelt down so he was at eye level with her, just as he’d seen Micah do it dozens of times.  
  
“You know how to use one of these?”  
  
She shook her head.  
  
“You want to learn?”  
  
She nodded.  
  
Turned out that the girl had a knack for it. She learned fast. Daryl cupped his hands over her ears as she pegged of one walker after another through the fence. He didn’t even notice that Micah and the others had come back. But all of a sudden he was yelling at him.  
  
“You had no right! What are you thinking? She’s just a kid. I asked you to look after her, not arm her like some child soldier!”  
  
Micah wrenched the gun from Jenny’s hands, grabbing it by the barrel, and searing his palm on the hot steel. He cursed and shouted and Jenny ran back inside, tears streaming down her face.  
  
Daryl didn’t talk to him for two days.

 

* * *

   
Like The Group, Micah had followed a rumor that there was maybe safety in the south and found Jenny along the way. He’d been picking the bones of some abandoned cars on the highway and Micah said that at first he thought she was dead because she was so skinny, just laying there in the backseat of a minivan. Just wasting away.  
  
There was no solid story on what exactly had happened. Her parents had gone to check the road up ahead or maybe they’d just left her. But either way they’d told the girl that they’d come back and never did. Daryl knew, beyond the shadow of a doubt that if he’d found that girl, like that, he would have left her to die. Or, at best, put her out of her misery.

 

* * *

   
“You were right, ok?”  
  
“What? Stay still.” The burn was healing slowly, mostly because it was impossible to keep it clean. He was trying to wrap it but Micah kept squirming away.  
  
“She should know how to shoot. I just, I don’t know. It’s like, if I can make things good and normal for her maybe the world can be good and normal again. And that’s unfair. To everyone. And I’m sorry. And you were right.”  
  
“It’s fine. Now stop moving.”

 

* * *

 

They went out to scavenge more frequently. And they were having to cast the net wider and wider. Had to drive almost 50 miles to the lake with the vacations homes. And he’d nearly missed the last house. Probably wouldn’t have noticed it at all if Micah hadn’t pointed to the overturned mailbox. The drive alone was nearly a half a mile, flanked by over run bushes, so they’d had to creep along as leaves and branches slid up and over the windshield.  
  
Aside from the overgrowth the house was pristine. Totally untouched by the sickness and everything that followed. It had a kind of fake quaint air about it, built to look like a cabin but big, excessive, and set back up the hill from the other properties.  
  
Inside they found all the furniture covered with dusty white sheets. Daryl thought it was creepy and Micah had laughed at him for saying so.  
  
“You afraid of ghosts?” he’d said.  
  
Daryl puffed up his chest in response. “I don’t like anything I can’t kill.” And that only made him laugh more, which was ok because he liked watching Micah laugh.  
  
They found the pantry about half stocked with canned goods and other things. As Daryl was loading his rucksack with beans and peaches he’d watched Micah lingering over a spice rack and a bottle of greasy separating ketchup  
  
He’d said, “Pack some of it, if you want.”  
  
“No use for it. I was just thinking.” He shook his head and gave Daryl a sad smile. “You finish here. I’ll go check upstairs.”  
  
“Check for what?”  
  
“Clothes,” he’d said, hooked a finger in one of the holes in Daryl’s t-shirt and pulled him close for a kiss. “Don’t forget the liquor cabinet.”  
  
He didn’t. There was wine and vodka and rum. Good stuff, too. And he loaded it like precious cargo into a cardboard box with some crumpled newspaper. By the time he had the bags packed and piled by the door Micah still hadn’t come down. There hadn’t been any noise. And that wasn’t always a good thing. Daryl took the stairs two at a time and when he got to the top drew the knife from his boot. He thought it was strange that the panic never stopped. He’d expected that they’d be desensitized to it after so long. But every closed door he passed, every empty room he swept made his heart beat a little faster.  
  
“In here. Last one on the right.”  
  
Daryl bit back a gasp and nearly dropped his knife.  
  
“Jesus christ, Micah.” The last door on the right  lead into a master bedroom. “You scared the shit out of me.”  
  
Like all the other rooms it was faux rustic and draped in white cotton. Drawers and closets had been flung open. There was a pile of hastily folded clothes sitting on the bed beside Micah’s pack. To the left there were cloudy double sliding doors that lead to a balcony. Through the door on the right there was a master bath, all shiny tile and couples sinks and a tub big enough for half a dozen people. Micah had taken his boots off and was slouched down inside the tub with his cheek pressed to the porcelain. His eyes were closed and his fingers skimmed over water that wasn’t there.  
  
“You take me to the nicest places,” he said, blinking up at him. “Now get me out of here before I decide to never leave.”  
  
Daryl took Micah’s hand and hauled him to his feet.

 

* * *

 

They loaded the car in quiet. The only things left were their packs and the booze.  
  
“It’ll be dark soon,” said Daryl. “We could just stay here. Drive back in the morning.”  
  
Micah looked more disbelieving than suspicious.It was such an uncharacteristic suggestion. Such an unnecessary risk.  And it wasn’t so late that they couldn’t make it back before dark. But still, neither of them moved.  
  
“What about the rest of the group? It’s not like we can text mom and dad and tell them we’re running late.”  
  
“So?”  
  
“They’ll come looking.”  
  
Daryl trailed a forlorn look up the stairs. “They won’t risk a search in the dark. We could leave early. Be back at the cell block in time for breakfast.”  
  
Micah followed his gaze. And he knew that they were both thinking the same thing. “What will we tell them?”  
  
“That we found the last clean comfortable bed in the entire world and couldn’t resist the urge-?”  
  
“Don’t say it,” Micah groaned. “You can’t just say things like that.”  
  
“Let’s stay.”  
  
“We shouldn’t.” But Micah dropped his pack on the floor anyway.  
  
Daryl felt a kind of drunken smile spreading across his face. “Lets go upstairs.”  
  
“We’ll leave early. Early enough to get us home by sun up.”  
  
“Scouts honor.”  
  
Micah scoffed and snatched a bottle of red wine from the box as he sauntered by. “You were never a boy scout.”  
  
“Was to. But they kicked me out.”

 

* * *

 

They raced to the bedroom. Micah had a head start so he won. Plus he toed off his shoes on the stairs, leaving Daryl to trip on them, which he normally would have thought was a dirty trick. But just then he couldn’t bring himself to care, ‘cause the sight that greeted Daryl as he skidded through the door was Micah throwing himself down on the bed, sprawled and arching off the mattress. He started to pull off his grunge covered hoodie but Daryl stopped him.  
  
“Where’s the fire?”  
  
“Nowhere, hopefully.”  
  
“Exactly.”  
  
Micah pulled him into bed and it took a concerted effort change their pace. There’d just never been an opportunity to do this slow. And Daryl didn’t even know how bad he wanted it until he had it, until he had Micah in his lap and they were just kissing and just touching.  
  
“Take your clothes off.” Micah said it like an order. “Take my cloths off. Something. Now.”  
  
“We don’t have to rush.”  
  
“Now!”  
  
Daryl was learning that he shouldn’t argue when he took that tone. Micah shrugged off his hoodie and lifted his arms so Daryl could pull off his t-shirt. He splayed his fingers across Micah's stomach, an improvised attempt to measure his waist. He thought maybe he looked a little narrower. Everything, Micah’s ribs and shoulder blades and hip bones kind of stuck out more. Not too dramatically. But enough that it bothered him.  
  
Micha got tired of waiting, shimmied out of his jeans and wrenched Daryl’s tattered shirt up over his head. “Pants,” he whined. “Now.”  
  
Daryl pulled away, a little grudgingly and sat up to unlace his boots. He could feel Micah watching him closely and when he looked back Micah was staring up at him half lidded with a smile slowly spreading across his face. Daryl lined his boots neatly beside the bed.  
  
“What?”  
  
“It’s just funny, seeing you look so domestic. Hurry up.”  
  
Daryl pulled off his belt, took his time, and hung it over the side of the headboard. “You either have a low opinion of me or low standards in general.”  
  
“Two days ago I watched you skin a opossum and cook it on a spit. Now you’re folding your jeans so they don’t crease.”  
  
“Oh yeah, I can do all sorts of tricks.” Daryl set his jeans on the nightstand, slipped off his boxers and dropped them purposefully on the floor.  
  
“Shut up. That’s not what I meant.”  
  
“I think you should fuck me.”  
  
Micah went still. “You think?”  
  
“I want.”  
  
“You’re sure?” Micah’s eyes glazed over. He looked hungry.  
  
“Yes.”  
  
“Fuck yes.” Micah pulled him into bed and kissed him like it was urgent. Like he was afraid Daryl might change his mind. Then all of a sudden he was gone.  
  
“Wait, what?”  
  
“Stuff - in the bathroom. Be right back.” He kissed him once more and rolled out of bed. “Don’t even fucking think about moving."  
  
He snagged the flashlight from Daryl’s pack where he’d tossed it on the floor. Daryl watched the yellow beam bounce around the bathrooms tile and marble.  
  
“You know, I think this is the first time I’ve ever seen you totally naked,” Micah called.  
  
Daryl laughed. “Yeah. Actually, I do.”

 

* * *

 

Micah was sinewy and tough and stronger now. And Daryl knew theoretically that there were or had been people in the world that were into being shoved around a little but he hadn’t really been sure what the appeal was. A girl he hooked up with at a party once asked him to pull her hair. But then she made these weird pained noises that made him feel like a bad person. When he said he couldn’t do it she called him a pussy. But when Micah pinned his wrists to the mattress above his head, gripping so tight that he left marks, Daryl got it. He felt safe. And relieved. And not completely in control.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I wasn't intending to break this into chapters. But I keep editing what I have instead of moving forward. So Imm'a just leave this first part out here with the hopes that it will motivate me to write the ending...
> 
> Comments and kudos are appreciated.
> 
> And I hope you enjoy what I have so far.
> 
> eta. Beth originally dies in this chapter. But I decided to resurrect her and made some other adjustments for the sake of the time line.


	2. Chapter 2

  
  
After, he was exhausted. And felt hollow and full all at once. Micah kissed him everywhere.  
  
“That’s a good look on you, totally wrecked. Perfect and wrecked.”  
  
Daryl wasn’t ready to make words yet. So he only moaned in response and tucked his face against Micah’s shoulder. He’d been called a wreck before but never the other thing.

* * *

  
Micah insisted on driving back and Daryl didn’t put up too much of a fight. It meant he got to sleep  a little more. A nervous looking Rick and a knowing looking Carol met them at the gate.  
  
“Do you think they’ll know?”  
  
Micah smiled and waved to them as they pulled through. “Probably.”  
  
“I’m serious.”  
  
“Well, you do look kind of happy. Maybe if you scowl more they won’t suspect.”  
  
Daryl punched him in the arm. “Come on.”  
  
“Would it be so bad if they knew?”  
  
“Micah, this is the south.”

* * *

  
They got a talking to from Rick. And later Micah said, “he’s right. It’s risky. We shouldn’t do that again.”  
  
But sometimes, once you know you can do a thing it’s easy to just keep doing it. Like when he was eight he’d learned he could slip candy bars into his pockets and walk out of stores with them. Once he knew he could do it and never get caught he just kept doing it. Even now, when there were no cops or shop owners to catch him at it Daryl found himself palming pens and coins and other things.  
  
And it was just like that. Once they knew they could sneak into other people’s houses and have sex it other’s people’s bed with minimum risk and suspicion they were doing it all the time. Making excuses. Running unnecessary errands. Wasting the gas and putting the others at risk by reducing their numbers. But Daryl couldn’t bring himself to feel guilty about it.

* * *

  
At first he thought he’d imagined it. But something was different. After that first time something changed. He was sure.  
  
When they were together Micah held him and kissed him a little harder which as good. And when they were with the rest of The Group Micah wouldn’t talk to him or even look at him which was what he wanted. And it all left a kind of dark squirming feeling in his chest.

* * *

  
He felt so stupid. They were always so focused on the walkers. No one thought about domestic sort of accidents like slipping in the bathtub or tripping off a curb or falling from ones perch on an upturned bus.  
  
He’d been up there countless times  
  
With no one to put them out the wildfires ran rampant. Thick black columns of smoke spiraled up into clouds. It was far enough off that it wasn’t a threat but close enough that the smoke and ash made his lungs burn. He would have to tell Rick. They would need some sort of plan if it got too any nearer. They should probably keep an eye on little Judith. Breathing all that stuff couldn’t be good for a baby. They might have to evacuate if the smoke got too bad. He turned on his heel to climb down and must have misjudged.

* * *

  
Daryl woke up in one of the cells. Herschel was fixing up his leg with a makeshift splint.  
  
“You gave us quite a scare, boy.”  
  
“More than a scare.” Carol was beside him. She gave him a hard smack on the arm and a kiss on the forehead. “I told you shouldn’t go up there. You could’ve broken your neck.”  
  
“I can’t know for sure how bad it is but the ankle is broken,” Herschel chided. “And she’s right. You’re lucky that’s all it is.”  
  
Carol started in on him again. But Daryl didn’t hear. The others were crowded around the cell. But Micah was right at the front, framed in the bars with his arms wrapped around himself. He looked angry or ready to cry. Daryl reached for him.  
  
“Micah?”  
  
He wanted to hug him and kiss the terrible expression from his face. He wanted Micah to hit him and lecture and fuss at him. But Daryl’s voice felt thick and faint and he tried to sit up but couldn’t quite manage it.  
  
“Now just lay back,” Herschel ordered. “I’ve given you a sedative and we don’t want you taking another fall.”  
  
Micah sniffed and turned away. Carol took his hand. “It’s gonna be alright. Just relax. Everything’ll be just fine.”

 

* * *

  
The black thing in his chest seemed to grow and ache and hover between them whenever they were in the same room. It was nagging and he didn’t know what to say or how to ask.

 

* * *

  
Daryl thought he might go crazy. Stuck inside for more than six weeks. Christ.  
  
At Herschel’s insistence he had to move into one of the cells on the first floor. And there was just nothing for him to do. Well there were things to do. But not things he liked to do. Nothing he could accomplish while comically hobbling on the single crutch that Herschel had been kind enough to loan him. Nothing that involved a firearm or spearing a small woodland animal.

 

* * *

  
Micah brought his meals around. Sometimes books. And they would talk a little. But nothing else. He told himself that it was just because of the leg. Couldn’t properly sneak around on a crutch, could he? Around week four he got bored enough that he actually helped with the laundry. And he would never admit it but the fact that the world kept turning, that things kept going, kind of gnawed at him.

 

* * *

  
“Can I ask you something?”  
  
Carol looked more than a little amused that he was coming to her for advice. “Sure...”  
  
“You where, you know, married."

""Yes?"

" So if something was wrong but he wouldn’t tell you what it was, like, what would you do?”  
  
“We didn’t really have that problem.”  
  
“Oh shit.” Daryl gaped at her for a long moment. “I don’t know what... Sorry. Shit. Just, sorry.”  
  
“Are you and Micah having some sort of spat? I haven’t seen the two of you together lately.”  
  
“No. No, it’s fine. Everything is fine.” He stared into the dirty soapy water for a long time. “I’m sorry. I don’t know what... I wasn't thinking.”  
  
“No worry,” she said. “Have you tried just talking to him?”

 

* * *

  
“Hey.”  
  
They’d found some sports equipment in a newly cleared area of the building. It was a big deal. Anything that provided fun or familiarity was a big deal, he guessed. But Daryl never really cared about sports. Micah was kicking a soccer ball around the yard with Carl and Glen.  
  
“Well look at you.”  
  
It wasn’t quite the reaction he’d been hoping for. Daryl wanted to jump him. He’d just assumed the feeling would be mutual.  
  
“Yeah. The doc said it might be a little weak at first.”  
  
“But good to be back on your feet, yeah?”  
  
“Yeah.”  
  
“Kick the ball!” Carl whined.  
  
“Holding is illegal,” called Glen.  
  
“Well I’m gonna, just, you know...”  
  
“Yeah. Yeah, of course.”

 

* * *

  
It had been two months. So it was urgent and fast. Micah shuddered and came and he was still for just a second, just for a few breaths, and then he was rolling off the cot and doing up his jeans.  
  
He slipped his fingers up the back of Micah’s shirt. “They won’t be back for a while.”  
  
“I know. But I could still get some weeding done in the field before sundown. And-”  
  
“That could wait.” The black thing seemed to loom over them like a shadow. Micah’s voice sounded so hard and the gap between them was so big now. Daryl tied to pull him back, tried to kiss him, but Micah squirmed away.  
  
“I told Herschel I would do it today.”  
  
“Is there something... Did I do something?”  
  
Micah pulled on his boots. “Nope.”  
  
“Then what the hell?”  
  
Micah sighed and scrubbed his face with his hands. “It’s the south, Daryl. But it’s not 1920.”  
  
“What?”  
  
“No one cares. Everyone knows and the only one who has a problem with it is you.”  
  
Daryl bolted upright. “They know? You told them.”  
  
“Jesus christ.”  
  
“Did you tell the others about us?”  
  
“Fuck you, Daryl. Seriously. Fuck you.”  
  
Just like that he was gone. And just like that it was over.

 

* * *

  
In many ways it was very much like before. They regarded one another like total strangers who had no interest or investment in one another at all. But now was different, too. He stopped taking his meals with the rest of The Group. Started going out to hunt, alone, for day at a time. Stopped talking to Micah completely. Stopped talking much to anyone. And if he did open his mouth it was only to yell and get angry.  
  
Rick had to take them both aside after a supply run. It would be winter all too soon and they were stalking up.  
  
“Whatever is going on with you two you best resolve it,” he warned. “Now.”  
  
They were getting sloppy. Not paying attention. Carl had had a close call. And Rick was willing to put up with a lot of shit. But he drew the line when his boy was involved.

 

* * *

 

Jenny's birthday was in August. They threw what little of a party that they could manage. Watching Micah laugh and joke and chat and play with Jenny was too much and he stalked out, feeling like a girl and an idiot.

 

* * *

  
Carol brought him diner. He’d moved back to his spot on the perch.  
  
“Not hungry,” he said, not even looking up from the clip he was loading  
  
“I’ll just leave it.”  
  
“No.”  
  
“You didn’t eat breakfast.”  
  
“Are you fucking deaf? I said no!”  
  
Carol set the dish down beside him. A year ago she might have cried or cowered away. But now she put her hand on her hip and held her ground.  
  
“I take it you and Micah aren’t ‘You and Micah’ any more.”  
  
“Whatever he said, it ain’t fucking true.”  
  
“Oh, he didn’t have to tell me anything.”  
  
“What does that mean?”  
  
Carol turned and headed back down the stairs.  
  
“What the hell does that mean!”

 

* * *

  
Daryl reached for the gun and Micah jerked away.  
  
“Micah, you don’t have to do this.”  
  
He shook his head and fixed Daryl with a hard stare. “Leave me alone.”  
  
Daryl had seen that look before.

 

* * *

  
They learn from their mistakes and start stocking up for winder eary. Go on lots of runs. They come back with a big haul and it takes a long time to load in. She must have slipped out then. No one noticed. They locked up the gate as usual. They didn’t have a clue that Jenny was missing until they heard the screams. She was alive when they got there but it was too late.  
  
Her body was only a few yards away, laying in the mouth of the gate. Micha had stayed with Jenny until she passed, holding her tight to his chest until Daryl had had to drag them apart. Losing them both would be too much for one day. His heart lurched as the body’s chest began to heave. It was waking up.

 

* * *

  
“She was always wandering off. How many time did I tell her not to-”  
  
“Someone else can do this.”  
  
“I said I would take care of her.”  
  
Daryl cradled his face in his hands. It was the first time in months that Micah looked him in the eye. “You did take care of her. But this, you don’t have to do this.”  
  
Micah couldn’t seem to steady the gun in his hands.  
  
“Let me.”  
  
“No.”  
  
“Micah...”  
  
He took the shot. Daryl fell back beside him on the pavement.  
  
“Oh God...”  
  
He dropped the gun into Daryl’s lap and stood to go.  
  
“Bury her for me. Please.”

 

* * *

 

Daryl digs her grave carefully so it was even and perfectly straight. Lined up perfectly with the others. Exactly half a shovel’s height deep.

 

* * *

  
The Group, everyone but Micah, was huddled in the mess.  
  
“Where is he?”  
  
No one answered at first. Just stared at him with red rimmed eyes. He could only imagine how he looked, face streaked with tears and dirt.  
  
“Micah,” his voice was breaking. “Where is he?”  
  
Carol was the only one brave enough to approach him. And she was the only one he would ever let hug him the way she did. “He’s in his cell, I think. He’s not well. Wouldn’t talk to anyone.”  
  
“Thanks.”  
  
“Are you ok?”  
  
Daryl shook his head and she held him a little tighter.

 

* * *

  
He wasn’t in his cell.  
  
“Don’t think this mean’s I’m not mad at you,” he said.  
  
Micah was waiting for him in on the perch, sitting on the edge of his stacked prison cots.  
  
Daryl sat down beside him. They were shoulder to shoulder and it was the closest he’d been to him in months. He only wished it were for a better reason. “I’m so sorry, Micah.”  
  
“All of her things are in my cell,” he said. “And I just, I want to sleep and never wake up.”  
  
“You don’t mean that.”  
  
“I do.”  
  
Daryl screwed his eyes shut. His throat felt tight and he was afraid he might cry again. “You can stay here, with me.”  
  
“You’re not afraid that the others will see?”  
  
“No.” Daryl pulled him close and kissed him softly and wouldn’t let go of him for a long time.


	3. Chapter 3

That night in the vacation house, that was the first time he’d ever slept in a bed with another person. He’d tried it once before, when he was seven. It was some TV show that gave him the idea. The clean blond child in the show got frightened and got into bed with it’s parents. And the clean blond TV parents had put their arms around the clean blond TV child and told it that everything would be ok. His father had threatened to beat his ass if he tried it again and Daryl had marched right back to his own bed.  
  
The night Jenny died, that was the second time. He put his arms around him and told Micah, he wasn’t sure that things would be ok. He had the nagging feeling that they wouldn’t be. But he would try.

* * *

  
It was cold outside their pile of blankets. And Micah was warm nuzzled against his chest. But Daryl needed to piss and he was hungry so he kissed Micah carefully, so not to wake him and slipped out of bed.  
  
The cell block was empty except for Carol who was sitting at one of the rec tables with little Judith in the car seat that served as a crib beside her. She was flipping through a battered Playboy. The wealth of porn they’d found around the prison had been staggering. Shocking, even to him.  
  
“Catching up on your reading?”  
  
“It’s a short story by this guy Palahniuk. You would like it, actually.” She smiled up at him. “There’s coffee.”  
  
Daryl grimaced. He wouldn’t exactly call dissolved brown crud in lukewarm water coffee but poured himself a cup anyway and dropped down on the bench beside her.  
  
“What time is it?”  
  
“One. One-ish.”  
  
“Christ.” Daryl choked down a mouthful of ‘coffee’. “Why didn’t anyone get me up?”  
  
“We, well I, thought it might be good if you had the chance to rest.”  
  
“Rest? Shit, you let me sleep away almost the whole damned day!”  
  
At his harsh tone Judith, who had been sleeping, began to fuss and threaten to cry. Carol rocked her gently.  
  
“You might want to show a little gratitude. Cause if you rile up this baby I’ll leave her with you,” Carol warned, “And I’ll see you never sleep again.”  
  
After a few minutes cooing and rocking Judith settled and went back to doing whatever babies do.  
  
“So,” said Carol, “how is he?”  
  
“He’s quiet. Angry. I don’t really know what to do for him.”

Carol patted his shoulder and gave him that silver lining look that he kind of equally loved and despised.  
  
“Well,” she said brightly, “Does this mean you’ll be changing your relationship status?”  
  
“What?”  
  
“In A Relationship,” she said, punctuating it with finger quotes as if that would make it make more sense.  
  
“So everyone already knew, huh?”  
  
Carol shrugged. “There were theories.”  
  
“Did you tell-”  
  
She laughed. “I didn’t have to. For two guys who didn’t seem to like one another you went on a lot of errands and spent a lot of time away from the group. No one was sure if you were just fooling around or if it was more than that.”  
  
“Shit.” Daryl turned his mug around and around in his hands. “I’m not sure I even know. It’s... complicated.”  
  
Carol and even Judith began to giggle.  
  
“Why is that funny?”  
  
She never told him. Just laughed harder.

* * *

  
Micah spent most of that next week in bed. Daryl spent most of that next week by Micah's side, railing and begging at him.

He'd stopped talking. And he slept alot. All things Daryl could deal with. Hell, he could have been right there with him. But then again, he’d put off things like mourning this long. Why start now? And he was mostly alright to let Micah ride it out in whatever way he needed. But then he refused to eat. Wouldn't even take water. And Daryl couldn't handle that.

Kubler-Ross, presented by Daryl Dixon.

"Maybe he's sick. Micah, do you feel sick? Maybe he's not hungry."

“Goddamnit. You know what? You are such an ass. A stubborn ass. Screw you.”  
  
“I’ll get rid of the poncho. I know you hate it and I’ll burn it if you just fucking eat something.” That at least got him to drink some water.  
  
“I can’t do this. Not so soon after. I just can’t”  
  
Then finally, “You know what? I don’t care. You’ve clearly made up your mind. Just fucking starve to death if you want to.”

On day six Daryl recycled back to stage two and got an idea. It was the type of plan one formulated while lying awake, worrying, at 3am. He pelted Micah awake with with packets of ketchup and saltines from the cafeteria. And at first Micah was furious, because it was about 3:15 in the morning. But then he started to laugh.  
  
“What the fuck, Daryl?”  
  
He pegged him in the face with another aluminum packet. “Say you’ll eat something. Anything. Or I’ll start throwing fruit cocktail and peanut butter.”  
  
“Ok, ok!” Micah put up his hands in surrender. “God, of all the weird shit you could remember.”  
  
They’d been laying in someone elses bed on one of their one night vacations and he finally had to ask, “What’s with you and the condiments?” Micah had bashfully admitted that his first foray into meatless eating was when he was about eight and he refused to eat anything but ketchup and white bread for a month and a half. Daryl had laughed and laughed until tears streamed down his face. But now he couldn’t help but watch, kind of fascinated, as Micah tore into one of the packets, squeezed ketchup onto his fingers and sucked it off in a way that was very much like a taunt.  
  
“I don’t think this actually counts as food,” he said.  
  
“I don’t care. As long as you eat something.”  
  
“You’re going to wake everyone up.”  
  
“I don’t give a fuck.” Daryl popped the lid on  a can of pears and forced it into his hands. “Eat.”  
  
“Condiments and canned fruit. You really know how to make a girl feel special.”  
  
“Shut up. And-”  
  
“Eat, yes. I got the gist of it.”  
  
When Micah kissed him he tasted like vinegar. He scarfed down the can of pears. Then peanut butter by the soopful. And by that time the sun was just starting to peek through the windows. They listened to the rest of the group stirring and groaning awake on the ground floor.  
  
Micah sighed and scrubbed his stubbly face with his hands. “It’s time to get out of bed, isn’t it?”  
  
“If you want to.”  
  
“You know, I kept waking up thinking that she was still here? Then I would realize that she wasn’t. And it was like doing it all over again. This is the first time I woke up knowing she was gone.”  
  
“Are you going to be ok?”  
  
“Yeah. I mean, I guess I’m trying to say thank you. Your methods are weird. But thank you.”

* * *

  
Merle was what you might call a bigot. Daryl had no qualms about admitting this. The man had a laundry list, longer than his arm, of people and demographics that he despised . He’d recited it to Daryl often. Fags, Queers, Dykes, and Sissies had been high up on that list. They occupied the top ten, at least. And everything he knew about queer-ness was based on that. Scurge of the earth. Turning your children and infecting them with AIDs. Fire and brimstone. That sort of thing. And it was the reaction he was expecting from The Group.

Slowly things went back to normal. They were coming back together. Micah moved his stuff up to the perch. They dragged out more cots and laid them side by side. It didn't happen as often at first. And it didn't have the rush of sneaking around. But sometimes, early in the morning, Micah would smile, press against him in the dark and whisper to him, "Can you be quiet?" He should have been relaxing into this. He should have been happy. 

But the expectation that the other shoe was about to drop still put Daryl on edge. He’d amped up the I Dare You Mother Fucker to compensate. Like once he thought he caught Glenn staring at them a second too long and he growled across the cell block, “Go fuck yourself, Pizza Boy.” Then Carl said something about something he'd learned in an American goverment class. And now that there was no goverment there were things that the government couldn't legislate. And Micah had had to drag him away before he did something stupid.

But the only people who really said anything direct about his outing were Rick and Axel.

 

* * *

  
Winter comes hard and fast. With the cold driving them inside The Group decided to finally start cleaning up the cell block. Not just empty the bodies and burn ‘em clean. Actually clean. Like PineSol and a sponge clean. They melted snow in buckets and scrubbed the walls and beds and floors, moving from one section of the building to another until everything shined.  
  
And it was at the end of a particularly long day. They’d collapsed side by side in the rec and Micah leaned close to kiss him in that kind of hard days work, well done, way. But Daryl dodged it and the kiss landed on his cheek.  
  
“Babe, you’re covered in walker,” he said.

"Did you just call me 'Babe'?"  
  
And they hadn’t even noticed Axel coming in. And Daryl wouldn't remember exactly what sort of convict, bunk mate, type comment Axel made. But he would never forget the kind of half lidded bedroom eyes Micah made or the way he sauntered over to him. He whispered something in Axel’s ear that made his eyes go wide and his ears turn a furious shade of pink  
  
“I ain’t no fag,” Axel snapped.  
  
“You sure?” Micah purred and Axel scampered off to his cell.  
  
Daryl was awed. “How..?”  
  
And it was like watching Micah slip back into his regular skin. He shrugged and raked his hair back from his face. “Gay panic.”  
  
“What did you say?”  
  
“You don’t want to know.”  
  
“What did you say?”  
  
“I asked him if he wanted to be our third?”  
  
“I didn’t want to know.”

 

* * *

  
“I didn’t want to do this right after Jenny died,” Rick started.  
  
It was a few weeks after and he’d pulled Daryl aside after evening meal.  
  
“I figured you had enough on your plate. I just want you to know that no one begrudges you a little happiness. And if they do I hope you’ll bring it up to me.”  
  
“I can handle myself, Rick.”  
  
“I know. I just... I want you to know this doesn’t change anything. And I’ve got your back. No matter what the situation.”  
  
“I appreciate that.”  
  
“Though you should know, I also reserve the right to give you the same shit we give Glenn and Maggie.”  
  
“I wouldn’t expect anything less.”  
  
He clapped Daryl on the shoulder. “I’m glad for you. Really. I wouldn’t have expected it but I’m glad for you.”  
  
Daryl shrugged. “Neither would I.”

 

* * *

  
After Micah told him the ketchup story he insisted Daryl share his own embarrassing missive.  
  
“Tell me something about your brother,” he’s said. “I always thought it would be fun to have a brother.”  
  
Daryl had to think about it a long time. But the only story that came to mind was his second driving lesson.

 

* * *

 

The old man took him. And every time Daryl screeched on the brakes or switched on the windshield wipers instead of the turn signal he would smack him across the back of the head. Hard enough sometimes that Daryl saw sparks. The whole affair ended with a screaming fight in the driveway and all the neighbors watching.

Daryl was a fuck up. No way was he getting behind the wheel of his truck again. Wasn’t like he was going anywhere anyhow.  
  
Next day had been a sunday. Which meant that the old man would be sleeping off the weekend's festivities until at least four. So early that morning Merle shook him out of bed, jangling the battered pick-up’s keys in his face.  
  
“The only other people on the road ‘ll be church ladies. So you won’t have nothing to worry about.”  
  
And that time he actually did well. Merle was uncharacteristically patient. And it wasn’t even Daryl’s fault what happened. Some kids from the high school sped past in their own truck, all dressed in their Sunday best, taunting and yelling and cursing. And Merle told him, “Just pay attention, just keep your eyes on the road. Ignore those assholes.” But then those assholes met up with them at a redlight. And they knocked off the driver’s side rear view mirror with a baseball bat. They sat at the light for almost ten minutes, with people honking and yelling because Daryl had started to hyperventilate. The old man would kill him for sure.  
  
Merle drove them back home and let Daryl out in the alley.  
  
“What are we going to do?”  
  
“We aren’t doing anything. Just sneak in your window. Act like you been reading those stupid comic books or whatever. If he asks where I am say you don’t know.”  
  
“Where are you going?”  
  
“That doesn’t matter. But when I get back lock your door.”  
  
Daryl did as he was told. Snuck in. Put his pajamas back on. When his dad stormed in cursing Merles name he played dumb and hid behind his Hellblazer comic. And around midnight when he heard the truck pull back into the driveway Daryl angled his desk chair under the door latch.  
  
At some point he’d learned to block out the noise of the old man yelling and his fists or belts colliding with skin. Even when it was him he didn’t really hear it. Sometime when there were a lot of walkers he got that way. Like his brain got overwhelmed so it just turned down the volume. But he could always hear the footsteps on the stairs after and the three soft, two hard knock that they’d worked out as safe code between them.  
  
Daryl slid the chair out from in front of the door and pulled it open. It was worse than usual. Merle’s Misfits shirt had been soaked with blood. His left eye swollen shut. He smelled like stale PBR. And he trudged passed without a word and collapsed on Daryl’s bed.  
  
“Don’t worry about it, little brother,” he said. “I know you’d do the same for me.

* * *

  
He would maintain that his brothers habits and attitudes, extreme, unfair, and unruly though they might be, did not make him inherently bad. The the list was, after all, inherited from their father. Merle had been the strong one. And he’d been the one to take all that on. Not just the hate speeches and the drinking and the shoplifting to keep their pantry stocked but also everything else. Everything that that entailed. Merle was dangerous and a hard ass and in the end it would all be his downfall. But he’d done it for Daryl. He’d done it so Daryl didn’t have to. So Daryl could be relatively safe. And if Merle had really cared that much about his baby brother then it would stand to reason that he might not care about what Daryl had with Micah. Whatever it was that they had. Or that was what he kept telling himself.

 

* * *

 

He couldn't bring himself to tell the story then. But after their early morning food fight Micah brought it back up. 

"You never told me about your brother. You owe me."

"You won't like it. 

"How do you know?"

He knew it wasn't eating only condiments and bread for a month and half. He knew it wasn't cute or funny. And he was pretty sure that no one, even Micah, would understand why his fondest  memory of adolesence involved his brother haveing the shit kicked out of him by their drunken tyrant of a father. 

"I don't want it to come off wrong."

"It won't."

Daryl took a deep breath. "I think I was fifteen..."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, I feel like this chapter is a little iffy. I think this is mostly because I don't know how the Merle vs. Daryl Thunder Dome Battle Royal thing is going to play out. 
> 
> Comments would be especially appreciated.


	4. Chapter 4

“When?” Micah asks. He means when did Merle die.

“Just before you came.”

“I’m sorry,” he says.

And Micah’s eyes are full of a sadness so pure that it’s frightening. And he keeps saying, “Sorry”.

“Shit, what are you sorry for? It’s not like you did it.”

“I know. I’m sorry.”

“Then why are you-”

“Crying like a girl?” Micah laughed bitterly and it sent more tears slipping down his cheeks.

“I didn't say that.”

“I just, I’m not sure what else to say. And I hate that that happened to you. And I’m sorry about your brother and I’m just... sorry.”

“Well it’s not worth crying over.”

Micah snaked his fingers up the sleeve of Daryl’s t-shirt, curling them around his shoulder, splaying them wide over the scars there. And Daryl realized it was the first time he’d ever touched him there. The first time maybe anyone had ever touched him there. “Yes it is. Of course it is.”

Later, when everyone else has gone to sleep, Micah will touch them again with his mouth and tongue and gentle fingertips. And Daryl wonders if it’s wrong that it led to this. But only for a second.

 

* * *

 

The cold really sets in in late December. Or at least his best guess is that it’s December. And thats when their numbers start to really grow. People are coming in out of the snow, drawn in by the smoke of their fires, almost every day. It gets hard to keep track. Even harder to keep track of rations. Who comes and goes and when. It’s a security nightmare. Because that’s a thing that they need now. Security.

A group meeting is called.

Someone brings up the idea of a council. And Daryl is the second to be nominated. By the meetings end Micah is bubbling with excitement and congratulations.

“You’re amazing,” he says, pulling Daryl close by his collar and kissing him quickly. “I’m proud of you. So freaking proud.”

 

* * *

 

The hype has died down. People have stopped staring at them quizzically. And Daryl has decided that he may like this thing, whatever it is.

He hesitates to call it a relationship.

Because the only relationships models he has to reference are those of his family. And this feels nothing like that.

Micah makes jokes about u-hauling. Daryl doesn't get it. But he feels settled. They've moved into a cell on the top level, kind of away from the others. He scavenged a bed for them, a broad beautiful hardwood monstrosity. They’d had to haul it up all three flights of stairs in pieces. And it took up much too much space. So he often stubs his toe on the toilet, which doesn't serve any real purpose anyway because there's no plumbing. And he hates the room for what it is, for what it represents. But it’s worth it. On the nights that he is tired and sore and has someplace soft to go, it is worth it. When they are in that bed and Micah is sitting astride him, kissing his chest, it is especially worth it. Worth enough that he can get over some uneasiness about the nature of jail cells.

The horse blankets that Micah hates so much are hung neatly over the bars, like curtains, which they keep drawn most of the time. They try to stay quiet but the woman below them still complains about the noise. It occurs to Daryl that this might be the longest he’s ever been with one person who was not Merle. And that seems wrong, to. Thinking of it that way. But that doesn’t make it less true. And what’s more troubling, he wonders what it means about him that his life somehow seems more complete when for the rest of the world everything has gone to shit.   

Either way. There’s no guilt or manipulation in what he and Micah are building. No pain or malevolence. There’s only shared sweatshirts, shared meals, and falling asleep with Micah’s fingers deep in his hair.

 

* * *

 

“I’m not gonna do it,” says Daryl.

All of the light drains from Micah’s face. “What?”

“I don’t want to.”

“Did you not see all those people in there who are behind you? Why not?”

“Because...”

Because, Before he could count the people he knew on a hand. He hadn't really even liked most of them. Then they’d all died. Yet somehow his world had gotten so much larger.

Just adjusting to life with Rick’s motley crew had been difficult. The excursions out into the woods had been more for the quiet than the game. And now, there were just so many people. People always looking at him and smiling and saying hello and expecting him to respond. And it was just so... overwhelming. 

“I’m not cut out for this sort of thing,” he said carefully. “Talking. To people...”

“Oh Daryl.”

“...making decisions.”

“You make decisions for the group all the time-”

“No.”

“Yes. Decisions that have saved us over and over.”

“But Rick-”

“Not Rick. You. People trust you. And you have the chance to do some real good.”

“I really don’t think I can.”

“Look.” Micah prodded him in the chest. “If you don’t want to do it because, I don’t know, you think it’s a dumb plan or you’re don’t want to take on more work, fine. Whatever. But don’t not do it just because you’re afraid.”

“I’m not afraid,” he snapped back. “Not of some stupid after school club, anyway.”

“Then prove it.”

 

* * *

So Daryl joins the council.

He knows that they’re in the last weeks of winter but the days still feel impossibly long. He thinks he might forget what sun looks like. He starts to doubt that his fingers will ever be warm again. But then, finally, there is a thaw. And it’s straight to work, planning scouting parties, gathering supplies, planting crops, organizing the labor to make it all happen.

 

* * *

 

The bike dies on the first day that it’s warm enough to ride it. To add insult to injury, it dies about a quarter mile into a supply run. He has to send the rest of the group ahead and push the stupid thing all the way home.

Micah is working in the garden. He spots Daryl from a ways off and runs out to meet him at the gate.

“Don’t. Just don’t say anything.”

Micah rolls his eyes. Sighs heavily. It’s a gesture that Daryl is becoming increasingly familiar and irritated with. But also, he thinks it;s kind of cute. It makes Daryl want to do _things_ to him, but in a good way. Or maybe bad. He can't decide.

“Do you want a hand?” he says.

“No,” Daryl scowled. “I’ve got it.”

He hit the first rise of the hill and gave the bike a great heave. But- “Son of a bitch!” -his boots don’t quite find purchase in the gravel and he slips, almost falls.

“Yeah. I can see that you've totally got it.”

Micah walked around to the opposite side of the bike, got a grip on the handlebars and squared his shoulders.

“Ok, 1, 2, 3...”

 

* * *

 

Merle got the thing third or fourth hand, as a gift to himself on his 25th birthday, and it had always had problems.

Even when it did run it was just a little too big for Daryl. Made him looked just a little bit like a child playing with a grown up toy. And despite the fact that the old chopper had gotten ‘em out of more than one pinch, The Group never seemed to tire of giving him shit for this. He knew it was only a matter of time. All good things must come to an end. A practical part of him knew that he could drive out to the suburbs, maybe even find a dealership somewhere, and have a new bike like that. But at the same time he doesn't want a nice bike or a new bike. He wants this one.

 

* * *

 

There’s a machine shop around the back of the prison. By the time they get the bike there they are both short of breath. Daryl pushes the bike into one of the work stations and when he turns back Micah is picking at his fingers

“This, this is how you know that I love you,” he says and holds them up for Daryl to see.

His hands are dirt caked from the garden, dried and cracked and bleeding at the nail beds and knuckles. Daryl can remember summers on landscaping and road crews when his own hands looked that way. His mother, when she worked at the industrial laundry, her hands would get like that.

“Wait, what?”

“Hm? Oh...” Daryl watched it sink in. “Oh, shit. I don’t know. It just slipped out. I don’t, I mean, I do but you don’t have to... Look, I wake up every day with death by walkers as a very real possibility. So it’s not like I’ll be totally demolished if you don’t-”

Daryl cut him off with a kiss. They go inside to find a first aid kit.

 

* * *

 

The nights are still cold. So they have a lot of blankets.  

Micah puts up the photo of him and his sister in their new cell. Except now he folds out the blond man. 

“His name was Peter,” Micah say, his eyes drifting to the crack in the ceiling above their bed. “I loved him and I murdered him. He got sick. And I had to.”

“Micah...”

“Just like Jenny.”

“It’s not murder.”

“But-”

“But nothing.” Daryl pulled him closer, if that was possible. Held him a little tighter. It’s... domestic. And that was a word he’d associated with “boring” in the past. But not now. “It’s not really killing. Not when they’re sick.”

Now he can’t imagine anything less boring or more perfect than being skin to skin under a pile of blankets in a stolen bed.

“Whatever it is, just don’t make me do it again.”

“That’s not a promise I can keep.”

“Then lie to me.”

 

* * *

 

They spend their little bits of spare time in the mechanics shop trying to resurrect the chopper.

Micah knows nothing about engines. And Daryl wasn't a very good teacher. So most of the time Micah would just sit on the work bench and watch. Kick his feet. Hand him tools. Offer unhelpful commentary.

“What are you laughing about now?”

“Well technically, I mean, it’s not supposed to be funny. But it kind of is.”

“What?”

“My parents," Micah sighed. "I have this picture in my head of them meeting you. You tooling this thing up their driveway.” He rapped his knuckles on the  gas tank. “I mean, they would die, literally."

“Hey, I’m no skinhead.”

“Yeah. But you’ve got that look about you...”

“I do not!”

“I would never hear the end of it.”

“So you’re family, they were ok with, you know...”

Micah shrugged. “Mostly.”

“So you would introduce me to your parents?” Daryl asks slowly.

“Of course.” Micah thumbed away a spot of engine grease on his chin. “I mean, at the very least it would be entertaining.”

Daryl swatted him across the ass with his shop rag.

 

* * *

 

Micah has a small black notebook and stub of a pencil that he kept tuck between the mattress and the wall on his side of the bed. Daryl never asked about it and he certainly didn’t expect Micah to just offer to tell him. Sometimes he would come back to their room at the end of the day and find him sitting in bet, scrawling slowly across the pages, and he would be quick to stash it away.

Daryl really had to work up his courage, sneaking away from work, in the mid morning when he knew that Micah was busy in the fields. And even then, he’d just stood there for a long time debating internally about the ethics of it before finally saying “fuck it”, and reaching into the space between the bed and the wall, scrambling until he found it

He would not, would not, would not read the words on the pages, he told himself. He thinks he sees his name a few times. Jenny’s as well. Carol. Maggie. Glenn. Micah’s handwriting is compact and beautiful in a way. He flips all the way at the end. There are only maybe three or four blank pages left.

 

* * *

 

“You know, it’s funny, “ Micah says. “Once upon a time, I was adamantly against children.”

Micah and Carol start holding classes for the kids. And it’s like he’s becomes everyone’s big brother. The younger ones, the ones who’d lost parents, and the preteens who were full up on surrogate mothers, they trail after him in the cell block or hug him spontaneously in the chow line. And sometimes it leaves him looking a little sad. He’ll grab for Daryl’s hand and hold on tight till it passes

Micah is starting to smile again. Or at least Daryl thinks so. Really smile. It’s not weary or forced out of obligation. No. It’s a fragile kind of happiness perhaps. But it’s genuine. He even laughs, sometimes.

“I miss her, to.” Daryl says. Because he knows that Micah can’t do it himself. Not quite yet.

 

* * *

 

Once the discussion of family is open there seems to be no closing it.

And it’s bittersweet. Micah’s face lights up when he talks about his sister. His mother. But Daryl knows that he should respond in kind. He’s just not sure how.

“I’m very charming. It would probably go very well.”

“He would probably string you up. Literally. Probably.”

Micah cleared his throat. “Mr. Dixon, I assure you my feelings for your brother are genuine. My intentions are entirely honorable and...”

Daryl snorted. “Honorable?”

“Yeah.”

“So that first day. When you came to me up in the tower. That was a show of your honorable intentions?”

Micah socked him in the arm.

 

* * *

 

When he finally gets the bike started again he is so goddamned overjoyed he thinks he might cry. He sprints out to where Micah is clearing walkers off the fence and scoops him up, hugging him tight.

“Do you hear that?” He doesn't know why but he’s panting and he’s smiling so hard it hurts. “Do you hear that beautiful fucking noise?”

“What are you talking about?”

“Just listen.”

Even from the yard it’s still clear, the growl of the engine cutting through the air.    
“Oh my god.”

Micah’s got surprise and walker bits on his face. But Daryl doesn’t care. He kisses him anyway.

 

* * *

 

He thinks if any part of life has returned to some semblance of normal it is that they are always busy. Between Daryl’s work on the council and the school they don’t see much of one another during daylight. And if they do get to spend time alone, together, it’s usually during a supply run.

He’d hated shopping malls before.

Too many people and parking lots and never enough exits. Daryl thinks that maybe he hates them more now. The lack of light and sound is unnerving.

And as if he knows, Micah starts chattering at him from the next aisle over.

“I don’t know how we’re gonna get this all in the car,” he says. “ And you know, it kind of makes you realize how impractical modern life was.”

They’re not looking for food, but new clothes. There’s not much method to it. They just grab things from racks and pile them into the carts, which they are slowly pushing down parallel aisles. Micah slumps over the handle of his cart, seeming to contemplate a button down denim shirt. And for a moment the scene seems almost normal.

“I mean, a lot of these’ll wear out in no time.” Micah strips off the shirt he’s been wearing for the past few weeks, lets it fall to the floor. The new shirt has snap buttons. And as he does them up the sharp click click click echoes around them. “Most of it’s no good for working. And you can’t exactly run in skinny jeans,” he says.

The denim shirt is a little loose in the shoulders. Before it seemed that the whole damned word had been highly concerned with the prospect of becoming too large for their clothing. But now everything wears down faster, both their clothes and their bodies. So they’re loading up.  

“Hey,” Daryl says. “Do you have that list of stuff the girls needed?”

“Yeah.”

“I’m tapped out over here. You want me to take it?”

"Sure." Micah ducked through the racks.and stuffed the scrap of paper into Daryl’s breast pocket. “Now tell me, whaddaya think?” He straightened the shirts collar and cuffs and turned on the spot, laughing in spite of himself.

“Very handsome.”

Micah blushed. Actually blushed. “Thank you for humoring me. Now-”

“But I’m not-”

“-I think socks and underwear are around the corner. For the love of god, please get yourself some-”

But Daryl was already pushing the cart around the end of his aisle. “Sir, yes sir.” When he looks back Micah is mock scowling at him. 

He unloads most of the “intimates” section into his cart and wanders as quietly as he can toward the office supplies.

 

* * *

 

Micah panics when he finds the abandoned cart.

They end up shouting across the parking lot, which he guesses is a kind of normal scene as well.

“How could you be so, so stupid?”

“Nothing happened!” But it doesn’t matter. Micah is already walking away from him. “I’m fine. It’s fine.”

“But it’s not, is it?!”

“Yeah, cause you decided to get so god damn dramatic about it.”

“Oh, fuck you!”

“Fuck you! Five second ago everything was alright and now-”

“And now you’re all I’ve got, and I’m scared!” he shouts. The pure fury in his voice is enough to stop Daryl dead. “Losing you scares me more than anything else.”

“Don’t call me stupid.”

“Don’t go off on your own.”

 

* * *

 

Fry cook.

Security guard.

Mechanic.

Mechanic.

Mechanic.

High School Teacher.

Carpenter.

Butcher.

Baker.

Candlestick Maker.

Journalist.

Male Stripper?

Mechanic.

Mechanic.

Mechanic.

Personal Trainer.

Cop.

Mechanic

And the speculations get more ridiculous. He’s waiting for it to hurt less.

 

* * *

 

It takes some bargaining. But eventually Micah agrees. He will learn to ride the Triumph. But only if Daryl agrees to cut his hair and shave.

“Sitting on the back, that’s really called riding bitch?”

Daryl sighed. “This is your front brake.”

“So in this arrangement, like right now, that makes you my bitch?”

“Pay attention. This is your throttle. Now, you’re just gonna ease into it.”

Micah’s nervous. Hard on the breaks at first. But he takes to it. The fact that there’s no traffic helps.

“You know, I thought you brought me out here for some fun.

“You need to know this.”

“Why?”

The bike used less gas. It was faster. It could cut through the clots of abandon vehicles on the highway when a car couldn’t.

“Just in case,” Daryl said.

“In case of what?”

On the way home Micah sits on the back, holding onto him tight, nuzzling into his hair. 

Later that night he changes his mind. Daryl doesn't have to cut it if he doesn't want to.

 

* * *

 

Micah is the only one who doesn’t ask about his past profession. And he loves him for it.

“But what did you do?” Daryl asks. And he knows full well that it’s not fair. He’d held off asking all that time because it didn’t seem right to ask Micah to divulge while he continued to refuse.

“You can’t laugh,” he says.

“Can’t make any promises.”

“Librarian. I was a librarian.”

Daryl does laugh. “So Before, you did basically what you’re doing Now.”

“No. I worked in a university library. More hungover college kids. Less story time.”

"And was that something you, like, went to school for? To be a librarian?"

"No. I studied writing. I was pretty ok at it, actually," he says. "I mean. I think I was. I got published a few times. God, that sounds so ridiculous now.

Daryl only laughs more. But only because he feels a little jealous.

“And what did you write?”

“Like I’d tell you now.”

 

* * *

 

He’d like to have gone some place nice. That was what you were supposed to do with this sort of occasion. Go some place nice. For dinner maybe? Light candles, or something. But they've got the electric lantern and the bike and a few cans of food in his saddle bags. And the sun is setting. He thinks maybe that’s nice. The skies are so much clearer now with almost no cars on the roads. It’s a different kind of nice. But nice all the same.

He finds a space on the side of the road, a little patch of open greenery.

“It’s going to be dark soon,” Micah says.

Daryl spreads one of the horse blankets out on the grass, sits down to unload his backpack. “Calm down. I’ll get you home before you turn back into a pumpkin.”

And Micah softens a little, toeing off his boots and sprawling out beside him. “That’s not how that story goes,” he says. “So what are we doing?”

At the bottom of his bag he’s got a small parcel, wrapped in a bandanna because he couldn’t find anything else. And he finds this suddenly and profoundly embarrassing as he presses it into Micah’s hands.

Daryl can’t watch. But he seems to take his time unwrapping it.

“It’s been a year,” Daryl says.

The noise Micah makes is so soft he almost thinks he imagined it, like he’s choking something back.

“I mean, I don’t know that it’s to the day or anything. But it’s close to when we first...”

“Still can’t say it out loud?”

His eyes go crossed and foggy. But he can still hear the smile in Micah’s voice.

“I know it isn’t much. But a year. That’s important. For me anyway. And-”

And Micah cuts him off in the best way, curling his fingers under his chin and kissing him hard. “It’s perfect. You’re perfect.” And draws back and turns the new black bound journal over  and over in his hands, fingers trailing slowly over the smooth leather. “Do you have a pen?”

“No, I didn’t think-- I’m sorry.”

“Oh shush.” Micah rifled his pockets a moment, found a stub of a pencil and shoved them both against his chest. “Write something, on the inside of the cover.”

“Why? It’s yours now.”

“I don’t know. Because I want you to. Please?””

He realizes suddenly that he can’t remember the last time he wrote something down. There’s been no need for it since Before. He can’t remember what his handwriting looks like. And even then he’s not sure what to say. It’s hard to concentrate when Micah kisses his neck.

 _I love you._ It is, he thinks, maybe, more important to write it than to say it. And Micah pulls him down into the grass.

 

* * *

 

Sometimes he thinks, if he could, he could just wrap Micah in tissue paper and keep in him a box. Well not literally. But just make him never leave the cell. Just make him stay there where it’s comfortable and safe and nothing can happen to him.

“But Daryl-”

“No.”

When people start getting sick Daryl tries to do just that. But instead Micah goes with Carl and Beth to help look after the kids. And that’s only ‘cause Daryl won’t let him help Hershel with the sick.

He won’t let Micah kiss him goodbye, either.

“I was in that cell block. I was exposed to... whatever this is.”

But Micah still reaches for him.

“I said no, god dammit!” And for a moment he fears that he sounds like his father. “If you get sick-- you can't get sick --I’d never forgive myself.”

 

* * *

 

Sometimes, they talked about running away.

He knows that for Micah it’s a joke. A fantasy. But Daryl still has it all planned out.

They’d find a house.

Maybe like the vacation house.

He’d liked it there.

Someplace near the water.

They could plant things.

It could just be the two of them.

No sickness. No rationing. No neighbor below them to complain. No voting on every damn thing.

They could do it, make it on their own. He knew they could.

 

* * *

 

He doesn't get sick. And neither does Micah. And he’s never been more relieved in his life. Or so happy to just put his arms around someone.

But it doesn't last.

The grumble of the tank draws them and everyone else out into the yard.

And before anything has even happened, before Hershel, before the first shot is even fired, Daryl shoves the keys for the bike against Micah’s chest.

“This is going to get bad,” he says.

“But you told me he was dead. How can-?

“It doesn't matter. You need to get our packs from our cell. And the second things turn you take the bike and you go.”

“Daryl-”

“Not to early. If someone hears the engine they'll follow you."

"But what about-

"You don’t worry or wait for anyone. Especially me. You go. And I’ll find you.” And it’s all a lie. He pulls Micah flush against him, kissing him hard, touching as much of him as his can because he doesn't really think he's ever going to get another chance. "I promise," he says.

Not long after they open fire. And he’s sure that this is the end. And the last thing he ever said to the only person that really ever loved him was a lie. So Daryl reloads and silently hopes that the next bullet hits him. Because he’d not sure he can live with that.

 

* * *

 

On a sheet of paper, tucked into the back of his journal, his new journal, which Daryl had got him for their (roughly) one year anniversary, Micah kept a tally of the days. Not dates or months. None of that mattered now. It was just the number of days between the beginning of the sickness and the walkers and now. Because Micah did things like that. He said he thought it was important to keep track of the time that had past so that people in the future would know. Because he believed in that. A future.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Remember how in the beginning I was all "Yeah, cannon timeline!"  
> Well, not so much anymore.  
> Also, I totes wrote that journal thing before I saw it on the show.  
> Also, I hope you enjoyed it!  
> Thanks for reading.  
> Comments and Kudos are love.


End file.
